Nightcrawler
by AzaleaRill
Summary: I've had these sitting on my drive for a while. Each chapter is a separate story, but they all revolve around Kurt Wagner, Nightcrawler. Keywords: Nightcrawler, Kurt Wagner, Wolverine, Logan, Ororo Monroe, Storm, tattoos, religion, death...
1. Friends?

**This takes place just after the camp scene in the X-2 movie - after Jean unlocked some of Kurt's (Nightcrawler's) memories.**

" _Gehen Sie weg, lassen sie mich allein..."_

Logan's grasp of German was non-existent (hell, he had trouble with plain ol' English and often just used his fists when he really needed to communicate) but he understood "go away, leave me alone" no matter what lingo it was babbled in.

He just pretended not to.

"I'm thinkin' we got interrupted back there," he said in his best " _I ain't gonna turn ya into coleslaw_ " voice, pulling out one of the congressional folding chairs and sitting in it backward. "You were sayin' somethin' about a circus..."

Kurt ignored the bland joke and Logan altogether, just a shadow in the dark counting the rosary. The beads were wrapped so tightly around his fingers that Logan was sure he was aiming to add a few more scars to the intricate pattern of raised tattoos that swirled across his skin. Ororo had said she thought Jean's little mind trick had worked to a bad effect on the mutant and it was apparent to the Wolverine that Kurt wasn't taking the sudden reminders to well.

Logan hated to admit it, but it seemed he and the fuzzy blue elf had a lot in common.

"...and because of' that little interruption," he continued lamely on the same front, "I never did get to thank ya for snatchin' Rogue back."

Without looking up or changing the tone of voice from the German cadence of his prayers, Kurt mumbled "It vould have been useless had ve crashed."

"Ya wouldn'ta done the whole jumpin' thing out again in that case?" Logan asked, clutching desperately at even that thread of conversation.

"I do not know," Kurt said thickly. "Eversing iz very confused." He turned away again as whatever had him sank its claws in deeper. "Ze things I know since Miss Grey...terrible things..."

"Yeah, she has that effect on people," Logan muttered darkly, Jean's comment about "ending up with the good guy" still fresh in his mind.

In that moment, he lost Kurt. The other mutant folded up in abject misery. Logan sighed in a long suffering way, knowing he wouldn't get anything out of the Nightcrawler for a little while now (except the German phrase " _Oh mein Gott, verzeihen mir")_ as his world completely broke apart.

Logan knew how it went - unsettling, incomplete memories, a disconnected remembrance of pain, and a terrifying sense of violence visited upon others. He thought about how it was too bad that the two of them couldn't just take to the bottle. Logan had found that though the alcohol (like his cigars) took the edge off his over-precipitous nature, his healing factor kicked in long before the buzz could develop a sting. For Kurt, who was obviously one of those "religious types," it probably just wasn't going to be an option.

So for the moment, Logan just acted as kind of a silent "company" - some kind of presence that the other mutant wasn't finding in his God at the moment. In that capacity, it fell to the rough, older man to bear witness when Kurt, his lamp-like eyes filled with a sudden and luminous horror, admitted to the darkness: " _I think I killed someone."_

That was the breaker. The switch that would flip the world for the teleporter one way or another. And it was in Logan's hands.

The Wolverine actually had to stop himself from saying " _is that all_?" Until recently, he'd have probably just popped his claws and waived six inches of razor sharp adamantium threateningly at Kurt, telling him to " _get over it_ " or something. But the Professor had actually been getting it into that metal thickened skull of his that a display of prowess was not the solution to every situation. Logan hadn't ever thought he had it in him to be a negotiator, but the world was showing itself to be continually full of surprises for the Wolverine.

"Only one thing ta do in a case like this," he said, clamping a cigar between his teeth pushing the chair aside. "We gots'ta make confession I 'spose."

Logan surprised the Nightcrawler right out of his terrified shock by grabbing a handful of Kurt's spangled coat and hauling him to his feet. He pushed the mutant up to the communion rail and commenced to yell toward the rafters on his behalf.

"Hey God, you bastard. You listenin' up there to a couple a' crazy muties? We got ourselves a confession ta make. We don't like your mysterious ways, got that? It's a bunch o' crap. Just don't work right for us and we want to file a complaint!"

The pigeons in the loft shuffled uneasily at the noise. Nightcrawler stared at Logan in a dazed kind of shock.

Now that he had the other's attention, Logan backtracked. "Don't think we've been formally introduced," he said, offering Kurt the hand he'd been hitherto shaking at the cross. "They call me Wolverine, but heretic's fine too if it suits ya."

* * *

Later, Ororo came across Kurt drifting back into camp in an aura of uncertain peace about his features.

"He didn't offer to show you his claws and give you something immediate to worry about, did he?" she asked carefully, unsure of the Wolverine's tactics even at the best of times.

"Kein er nicht...no," Kurt said, almost smiling through the weariness in his eyes. "Herr Logan...he iz good at making things understood."

Ororo was dumbfounded. What she had actually expected was for Logan drag the Nightcrawler back into camp and she had only hoped the devout German would be in one piece. This turn of events was beyond her and stood far outside the of how she thought she knew Logan.

But it hit right on solid ground when Kurt said "He told me to let you know...in zere morning to look for him in ' _his church_ '?"

She could only hope the Wolverine would leave the bar standing.


	2. Ink

**This one is in the the X2 universe - post movie. Kurt is looking to finish one of his tattoos.**

"Kurt, this is Tom..."

The heavy-set, grandpa-ish man whistled long and low as he caught sight of the Nightcrawler. Kurt ducked his head in embarrassment, unused to being so conspicuous, preferring the shadows of vaulted ceilings where his indigo skin blended into the darkness. He felt more aware of his demonic appearance here and almost regretted allowing Ororo to talk him into this.

"I guess ink would have been a bit rhetorical, eh mate?"

Kurt suddenly realized that it wasn't his strange features the man was occupied with, it was the raised angelic etchings trailing their strange pattern over his face that he had an eye for.

"Ach...yes," Kurt said as the tension of the moment before faded. He stepped forward to shake the man's hand, his bright, amiable smile completely at odds with the darkness of his physical character. "Ze traditional method vas not readily available anyvay...but zen, I do not really live in a traditional...vay...you see."

The man nodded in understanding and ran a thumb over some of the designs on the back of Kurt's hand with artistic interest. "You can call me Ink by the way," he said. "My friends always do and any friend of Storm's is a bosom companion to me by default."

"Ink is the best tattoo artist on the east coast, Kurt." Ororo gestured to the impressive artwork on the walls. "He's honestly the only person _I_ would trust with this."

Ink's boyish face lit up. "Well, are you finally going to let me blemish that beautiful mahogany skin, lass? Be the honor of a lifetime," he said enthusiastically with eyes hungry for the desired canvas.

Storm gave her friend a teasing look. "Not today, Ink, or tomorrow or likely ever. It's Kurt I'm putting into your skilled hands."

The balding man looked truly pleased at this information; Kurt could almost see the stylized vision that was probably running through the Ink's mind. "Non-traditional it is then!" he said in excited tones.

He beckoned them through a partition and into the studio which, like the show floor, was covered floor to ceiling in mock-ups and bright blazes of Ink's designs. "I haven't had much of an opportunity to do anything but biker logos and barbed wire all week, so this'll be a real treat," he said, pulling out a few chairs from under their piles of books and snapshots. "So what's your taste _mein freund,"_ he chuckled at the unfamiliar phrase. "Or the occasion as it were?"

Inwardly, Kurt's spirits fell. His first impression of the man had been a good one and he liked Ink's friendly attitude. But a spiritual journey was a very difficult thing to put into words and Kurt was not sure he was ready to share such a painful experience (both emotionally and physically) with the jocular artist. But Ororo was obviously close with the man and had a deep respect for him. For that reason above all others, Kurt was willing to try.

"Maybe at ze beginning," he said almost to himself, and then to Ink: "It iz more zen an affectation _heir_ Ink," he said, using the German honorific seriously and not in the teasing manner of the tattooist. "Every one tells a _geschichte_... a deep story..." he trailed off, tracing the neat scars that ran their dangerous pattern on the insides of his wrists, his sensitive nature coming back into play in the light of trying to explain his profound feelings about Catholicism.

Ororo slipped her warm hand into his and Kurt looked up, first at her and then to her friend. Ink's eyes still held their friendly light, but he had acquired a more serious, understanding air than before. Under their gaze, Kurt started to explain again, but this time he lapsed into articulate German - his native language allowing for a release that his heavily accented English just couldn't encompass. Whether they understood the words or not didn't matter, the feeling he put behind them transcended language altogether.

"They're angelic symbols, aren't they?" Ink inquired quietly of Kurt after the younger man's outpouring had run its course.

"Yes. They vere handed down to man from ze Archangel Gabriel," Kurt said, smiling ruefully and squeezing Ororo's hand, thinking on the similarity of this discussion to a past conversation.

"How many do you have?"

"One for every sin, so quite a few."

Ink nodded knowingly and didn't ask what sins, or whose for that matter. He cleared his throat and asked in a professional tone: "May I see?"

As inconsistent as it seemed with his modest demeanor, Kurt didn't seem to have problem with shrugging out of his shirt for Ink's inspection. Years of wearing form melding costumes and changing in crowded tents had at least left him with few inhibitions when it came to the human (or mutant) body, including his own.

The intricate designs covered his chest and arms in a raised, labyrinthian pattern that was nearly hypnotic if one got to following the trail. What Ink very much noticed, though, was that the symbols didn't cover Kurt's entire body. They stopped at the curve of his ribs - his back was a blank canvas, an area that was inaccessible to his own reach.

Ink was suddenly and deeply impressed when the realization dawned on him that the acrobat had carved those complex designs into his skin with his own hands.

"I'm honored at what you're trusting to me here, mate."

"Your vork is beautiful," Kurt said, gesturing at the wall. "But...vell...how is it you do not carry any of it vith you?" He glanced meaningfully at Ink's bare skin. Not even so much as a dot of art was apparent on his burly arms or any other part Kurt could see. He wasn't sure he wanted to entrust such an operation as this to a man who had never touched the needle to his own skin.

"Oh" said Ink, suddenly laughing. "You mean these?"

The older man's skin was suddenly infused with color that moved and swirled before coalescing into an elaborate portrait.

" _Mein Got!"_ Kurt drew back, startled at the sudden revelation.

Ink blinked and the colors shifted and ran together to form different designs. It was like the man had walked into the light from a projector and the slide show was playing out with him as the screen.

"You didn't tell him?" he asked Ororo through his amusement at Kurt's reaction.

Storm shrugged. "You're my friend for who you are, not what. It shouldn't matter whether you're a mutant or not."

"Just not one with any talent that would save the bloody-world is all." Ink let the drama playing out on his skin fade. "You know what it's like to be addicted to the ink when you're a kid and have every design you put on fade within a day? Frustrating as hell, if you'll excuse my French. Took me the longest time to figure out how to bring them back to the surface."

"I vould say I had a similar problem," Kurt said, becoming companionable now that the two of them were on familiar ground together. "Ze ink would not show vith my skin... and zere was no-one all zat willing to try anyhow. I used ze only method I could think of."

"That's why it's been used for thousands of years, mate. Was the dark skinned tribes of Africa that started that particular practice for obvious reasons."

"I am glad you understand, _hier_ Ink. Zere are many who see it az...how to say...a vay to hurt oneself." _Instead of a way to stop the hurting_ , Kurt said, keeping the last to himself.

"And the one we're going to work on tonight - if you'd so honor an old artist - I take it you already got it all planned out and were just waiting for the right hands." Ink displayed his palms to Kurt. On one, the image of the cross appeared; on the other, the latin phrase " _dirige nos Domine."_

The Nightcrawler was moved by the gesture. To know that the task would be in the hands of a man not only of superb talent, but also of faith was deeply comforting to him. He purposefully pulled out the designs and folded them out on Ink's workbench, revealing a strange design composed of curving and intersecting lines.

"It iz the sigil for Michael himself," Kurt explained. "Ze commander of ze army of God, but iz also known az an angel of mercy. He iz a patron saint for ze German nation."

Ink just sat back and listened as Kurt spoke passionately of the seraph closest to his heart. Any good artist knows that to make a piece worthy of that person on whom it would appear, you had to know the story behind the image. He came to understand how deep faith ran with Kurt; it was what gave life meaning and explained the inexplicable. But what the elf had said before: " _One for every sin_..." that told Ink that there was a lot of pain behind his need to follow that faith. One couldn't look as Kurt did with lamp-like eyes, demonic blue skin, and prehensile tail and not have some "sin" forced upon him.

"It vas never finished, see?" Kurt showed Ink the half of the symbol sketched out on the paper that had not been applied to his body, then pointed out where the first part of it started just under his eye. The scar trailed down his cheek and stopped just beneath his ear.

And then, Ink truly understood what it was Kurt was putting into his hands. The latter part of the design looked simple enough on paper, but when it came to applying it, simplicity would be the last thing on the artist's mind. To achieve the raised pattern of the rest of the design, Ink would have to use a _hatching_ method of scarification with a very sharp scalpel down Nightcrawler's neck, following the curve of the pattern around to a looping W at the base of his skull. If his hand were not steady or he cut to deep anywhere in the process, Kurt could bleed to death in a matter of minutes.

"Like I said before," Ink said quietly when Kurt had finished. "You're trusting me a hell of a lot further than I think a lot of people ever have. I'm honored by that."

"Ach, but you see, ze instrument may be in your hand, but vhat happens iz not." Kurt turned toward Ororo at this as if he sensed the sudden pain that crossed her features. "Zis one vill not be just for ze sin visited upon me, or for what I was forced to do to others. It iz for a friend who taught me what . . . _Verwirkung . . ._ sacrifice truly means." It had taken him a long time to understand that Jean had only been an instrument of God's will and that neither he or any of those who loved her could have made any difference in that fact.

The hours of the night grew small as Kurt sat under Ink's bright light and his careful ministration. The artist saw the way Ororo held Kurt's hand, how the talked quietly during the whole process. He knew he wasn't the only one who would be causing some little pain in the next few days, nor that he would be the one taking Kurt from her. His hand was steady as it had ever been and somehow the well trained acrobat kept his muscles relaxed under the deep cut of the blade, though he became alarmingly silent and withdrawn as Ink etched out a swirl of the sigil around the strange, angry scar at the base of Kurt's skull.

Later, after they had gone, Ink would sit down and carefully sketch out all he could remember of the symbols covering the devout mutant's body, and then spend even longer contemplating such fierce devotion as he had witnessed that night.

The day seemed short that Kurt lay in Ororo's arms, tired beyond his nocturnal nature. A white bandage protected Ink's work, but a distinct replica of the pattern now etched on Nightcrawler's skin worked its way to the surface. The angelic symbol blazed in red and seemed to burn like a supernatural fire surfacing from the deep.


	3. Faithless

**This one isn't based on any story-line that I know of. I read the "Nightcrawler" series and that's where Christi kind of comes from - but otherwise it's just something I came up with. Kurt loses his faith.**

The pages tore far too easily.

Kurt's faith was shredded like clouds in a cold wind. He let the damp paper fall to the ground, appalled at how like refuse those once-sacred pages looked crumpled on the gray pavement. Another page tore, another, and another as he waited for some sign that would tell him it was not just a mockery, that the words he had followed for so long were not just the ramblings of over-ambitious man – the mutterings of a sick child.

A whole handful of carefully printed pages parted ways with the wet binding of the Book. Scrawled notes and archaic symbols (the likes of which he had etched into his very flesh) began to bleed under the influence of the heavy, damp sleet. And yet, no matter what damage he wrought that tome, that physical embodiment of a force he had so completely trusted, no hand reached forth to stay the execution.

The Bible finally dropped from Kurt's nerveless fingers and the rosary beads that followed clacked hollowly in the gutter. The Nightcrawler bowed his head and wept.

He was truly alone.

* * *

He showed up all wet on the raining winter step, wearing shred more than his skin.

Christi crawled up on the couch behind Kurt, pressing the cold, metallic disk of the stethoscope against his back. "Ok…deep breath and hold it," she said, reaching to brace one hand against his chest. The skin beneath the dense, blue fur felt feverish and there was a slight catch, a certain rattling in his lungs. She knew if she didn't watch the blue elf close, he would develop a serious case of pneumonia.

Shifting the scope, she listened again for the tell-tale sound…and realized he'd gone very still, holding that first breath. His whole body was taunt beneath her touch, and a terrible shaking suddenly took hold of him as he folded up in against some terrible pain. Christi dropped the scope and pressed into his back, sliding both arms around him to try and help protect him. Her fingers were suddenly caught in an almost painful grip against his chest as he fought against a wall of anguish.

"Let it go, Kurt…let it go," she said quietly, knowing some grief was already tearing him to pieces. His breath sighed out in a long suppressed moan, the next drawn in a heart-wrenching sob. Somehow, his world had ended.

* * *

"You came!" Christi didn't try to keep the surprise out of her voice as she opened the door.

Logan, loomed on the threshold with a well-worn cowboy hat pulled low over his eyes, merely shrugged and growled something unintelligible. Moving aside to let the stocky, rough-looking man pass into the hall, Christi noticed a bulky shape in the back pocket of his faded jeans.

"Where did you find it?" she asked, knowing what it was before he even pulled it out and handed it to her. Kurt's Bible was crusted in grime and the pages, or what was left of them, were soggy and started to disintegrate even as she tried to wipe some of the mud from the binding.

"Gutter down the street," he rumbled. "Long with these." The Wolverine pulled a tangled mess of rosary beads out of his pocket. Ignoring her distress at the state of Kurt's most sacred possessions, he took off his hat and headed down the hall. It looked to Christi as if Logan was going to barge through the house in his usual gruff manner until he found the elf, and then very physically shake some sense into his friend. She hurried after, intending to put herself between him and the bedroom door if need be, though getting in the way of the Wolverine was not the best choice anyone had ever made.

But she was reprieved of any heroics by the fact that Logan stopped when he found the right room and just leaned heavily against the door-frame, hands shoved deep in his pockets as he contemplated the dark interior. The last light of a winter evening filtered into the room through the blinds, just barely picking out Kurt's huddled from occupying the bed. The tall, lanky German looked like a wounded animal lying in a dark corner waiting to die.

"How long he been like this?"

Christi hugged the book to her chest as if it could somehow become a shield against the pain in her heart. "He hasn't spoken since he came yesterday morning. I found him outside just before dawn and . . . I want to help him Logan. He's getting sick and I can't…" her voice caught on the words. "I can't help him if he won't let me." She stopped and pressed her lips tight together, blinking hard, unable to tell him how Kurt had clung to her like a child terrified of what was in the dark.

Logan let out a long-suffering sigh and threw his hat on the dresser. Christi saw him pat his pockets absentmindedly from long habit while he stood looking at Kurt. He finally slouched into the chair by the bed where she had sat vigil for the last several hours, desperately hoping that the man who had only muttered curses on the phone would come. Logan pulled off his mud-caked boots and, settling deeply into the chair, propped his feet on the bed, looking for all the world as if he were just stopping by for a nap.

"You got any 'a that green tea crap? Elf's fond 'a that."

He popped his knuckles loudly; his hard, resolute gaze taking in the pathetic form of Nightcrawler.

Every inclination told her not to leave, but she buried her preconceptions and forced herself to walk out of the room. She left the stained Bible on nightstand near at hand and said nothing about the pots of tea she had already brewed to no avail. The Wolverine had his methods and she had to trust this instinctively brutal man – his nature might be the only battering ram able to break down the walls Kurt had built.

Logan craved a cigar and found himself patting his empty pockets in search of the sweat tobacco and matches. He remembered how the thick wash of nicotine had always helped him relax, cleared his mind in the face of any situation. But he'd given it up and honestly felt better for it, but it would at least have given him something to do while he sat in the dark.

He'd just have to be his old, blunt self without the softening aura of the smoke.

"Hey elf," he said to the near invisible form of Kurt. "Nurse honey there is wantin' to help ya. Your givin' her a helluva lot o' trouble on your end."

The Nightcrawler gave no indication whatsoever that he heard. The only sound came from Christi putting on the kettle far away in the kitchen.

"You best give up with that feelin' sorry for yourself crap. Old wolvie's seen 'em hurt worsen' you and ain't got no sympathy for a mutie who's gone to lettin' somethin' eat at him so." Logan's only known method was that of attack. He'd mentioned once or twice that he didn't hold with any of that Freudian stuff. According to him, all a crazy despot truly needed was a really stiff drink and a hell of a good kick in the ass. If the Wolverine had to get his claws out in the mean time, so be it.

As simple and cruel as it seemed, it worked for the scruffy loner. A slit of gold from Kurt's lamp-like eyes appeared, turned in his direction. Logan seemed not to notice the change as he picked up the filthy Bible and shook dried mud from its pages. Leaning back in his chair to look through the partially open door, he made sure Christi was busy with the tea before he popped his claws.

The six inches of razor-sharp adamantium could have shredded the book into coleslaw, but Logan was as dexterous with the half-foot of lethal weaponry as an expert chef is his knives. He used one claw to delicately peel apart the water logged pages until he came to the section showing the most abuse. The claws _snikted_ back between his knuckles and he perused the running ink, able to read perfectly in the dark with his enhanced vision and the aid of a blunt finger following the lines.

"Did a real number on the ol' Testament, didn't ya elf," he asked, absorbed in studying the stenciled angelic symbols in the margins – exact copies of which decorated Nightcrawler's indigo skin. The page he studied had been partially torn out, but a good fraction of it still remained – as if Kurt had suddenly been defeated by something and stopped the willful destruction. Logan tried to decipher the archaic German, intoning the words badly in his gruff voice:

" _Ich bin der … Lord Ihr Gott_ ," he mumbled, turning the book sideways as if that would help. "Bunch'a ramblin' about God I spose."

Suddenly, the book was ripped from his grasp and sent crashing violently against the wall, scattering picture frames and breaking things as it went. Nightcrawler had slammed full-force into Logan's chest and luckily catching the instinct-honed mutant off-guard and not ending up with six adamantium blades through his chest. The acrobat was able to pin Wolverine's arms to the chair for just a moment with his ambidextrous feet, his prehensile tail whipping angrily through the air as he leaned close and clamped his hands tight to the other's collar.

" _THERE IS NO GOD_!"

Logan felt his blood turn cold in the face of that vehement declaration. He didn't try to quell the defense mechanism that was as grafted to his nature as the metal was to his bones and knocked Kurt back with a blow of his forehead to the other mutant's face. It was a powerful enough motion to throw the Nightcrawler backward, but not quite enough to keep him down. He tucked himself up in the small space, performed an impressive somersault and launched himself back at Logan from the opposite wall. In those few half-seconds, Logan had to remind himself that the man was still his friend no matter how messed-up by untold events. It took that much and more for him to keep his claws sheathed.

Christi stood with her hands clamped over her ears to mute the sounds coming from the other room. Whatever awful thing it was that _had_ been happening to Kurt, she knew at this terrified moment that it might possibly not have been as terrible as what was happening to him at the hands of Wolverine. She had known the inevitability of this outcome when she called Logan and thought she could accept it if it would pull Kurt back to a rational state.

Now she knew she had been wrong!

Logan wasn't a creature with which one dealt lightly. He was as unpredictable as a rabid animal and as terrifyingly lethal. Christi hadn't let herself think for a moment upon the deadly turn the state of affairs could take if Nightcrawler, in his irrational and feverish state, attacked his brutish friend. Though described as impulsive and uncontrollable by all who knew him, she had developed an uncanny trust of Logan that, through desperation, she had to put to its truest test.

A sudden silence struck only more fear in her as silence after an X-Men battle usually meant there was absolutely nothing left to say and no-one to say it.

She made the first, hesitant movement when an unexpected _BAMF!_ of displaced air brought Kurt heavily into the wall. As soon as he hit the floor, he lashed out in confusion, blind to his surroundings and deep in an inherent defensive mode that overcame all rationality. Just by chance, he caught a handful of her blouse and would have sent her across the room as if she were just another piece of furniture had not Logan interceded

The speed with which he caught Christi before she made a painful journey across the room and then wrangled Nightcrawler were only believable because of his mutant abilities. With a string of curse words so black they could have curdled milk, he cornered Kurt and put him in a tight hold that defied even the acrobat's ability to break. The Wolverine jammed his knuckled up under Kurt's chin in a threatening gesture when the other's struggles continued.

"Do it, mon geit…Logan…I do not wish to stay…in such an empty place."

Christi felt a wail rise up in her throat and bit her lip hard enough to taste copper, sure that she would hear the metallic twang of Logan popping his claws, the man finally giving into that deadly impulse in light of Kurt's blatant weakness, something that always infuriated the man beyond rationality.

A moment later, she was as ashamed as she had been frightened. He locked eyes with her as Kurt dropped exhausted to the floor. "He don't know what he's sayin'," Logan muttered, his gaze accusing her of believing he was a cold as his adamantium skeleton and as impetuous as the feral creature of his namesake. "Somethin's gotten into his mind and he ain't lettin' it go."

During the whole endeavor of just a few moments Logan had hardly broken a sweat while Kurt, struggling to his knees, was drenched and trembling with fatigue. He was like a rag doll that Logan picked up and dumped unceremoniously into a kitchen chair, looking crumpled and fragile in his misery. Wolverine pulled up another chair and sat in it backward, his hands once again going automatically to his pockets in search of his cigars

"Now then elf," he said, giving up the search in frustrated resignation. "I think Miss Christi has herself a few errands to run…"

* * *

A bell-tower struck chimed the hour somewhere in the still night, the cold air carrying the sound half-way across town.

Christi sat on the steps to the building with knees drawn close. Her "errands" had been to walk up and down the street for the last hour fighting the desire to peer into her own windows. She had shown Logan her true lack of trust and this was her payment for such, to be relegated as a hindrance and ejected from her own home while he dealt with Kurt and didn't "baby him," as the mutant had termed her methods.

The last chime of the clock coincided with the click of the door behind her. Logan came down the stairs and, surprisingly, sat down beside her on the cold stoop.

"Kid's been hurt bad," he said, fingering his old cowboy hat in a distracted way. "It's one o' them injuries to the head . . . ya know . . . inside."

Christi nodded. "His faith, he's lost it…"

"Nah, it'd be easier if he'd just lost it," Logan said, coming to the point. "Somethin' that's lost might be found again. No, everythin' he believes in been shredded like that ol' book a his; completely destroyed and as far as I can see."

The cold with which she shivered had nothing to do with the temperature. "What can I do for him? How can I help him?"

"Seein' as I know a lot about beein' destroyed and rebuilt both inside and out, I can only tell ya not to coddle 'im. He's startin' from ground zero and has got to have some firm ground to build on. I got him started, knocked some sense into him if ya will." The Wolverine actually cracked half a grin at this as he stood and jammed his hat on his head. "The world's goin'a be a hell of a lot meaner place to him, goin'a be a lot like Hell actually . He ain't never goin'a be the Kurt we used to know," He said, and walked off, a silent and solitary figure into the night.


	4. Lost

**This one fed off of "Faithless" - Kurt is going through the motions, trying to find that which was lost.**

Kurt slipped into the dimly lit church, silent as a shadow and just as invisible. The aisle and the pews were a dark sea around the island of light that was the choir loft, brightly lit as practice continued into the early darkness of a winter night. Half sung phrases and the constant giggling of the younger members of the ensemble echoed through the empty building, a blatant contrast to the emptiness and the haunted state of both the old church and the Nightcrawler.

He slid into a back pew far away from the light as the choir director brought his singers to attention and began explaining passages from the hymnal to them. Kurt sat for a time, watching and waiting. The old comfort was easily remembered; the comfort of entering a house of worship and feeling surrounded by a sense of awe and calm at the same time. No matter what battles he was fighting on the outside, he could always trust that he had a place to go inside that would not fail him, no matter its mystery or conflicted nature. The strength embodied in that place, the continuity of it was what had made it the loadstone that drew him.

But that was gone.

He could reach for it, remember the motions and the words and even the sense of the thing, but the actuality of it – the faith that held the whole complex structure together – was gone and he was left with nothing but jagged rubble that cut him anew at every turn.

Yet he went through the motions, aching and hoping that something would break through and give him a sense of assurance again. He knelt and crossed himself, hardly feeling the obvious absence of his rosary beads. He bowed his head and began reciting a simple prayer from his childhood. The words were hollow, empty and without meaning to him. He saw right through them to contrivance and instantly they were ashes in his mouth – they meant nothing. A Bible nestled in its place on the back of the pew before him seemed a mockery with its gilt lettering and leather binding. He had the sudden, anxious desire to fling it away as he had his own, that thick little volume that had been with him over half the earth.

He looked away and the anxious desire passed. The choir muttered a few phrases together, sight-reading some unfamiliar music, completely trusting their maestro to lead them through the complexities of the melody. Kurt felt again the deep ache of what he had lost.

As something of a guard against the pain, he went back to the motions. He unfolded the kneeling bench at his feet and dropped to his knees. Resting his elbows on the back of the pew, he folded his strange hands together and lifted his eyes to look to the crucifix above the altar. It seemed lusterless and wooden – a gilded representation of a lie and a forfeit. Kurt dropped his hands and his eyes before the condemnation that filled his throat could be voiced in the too quiet sanctuary. He swallowed it down hard and folded his arms beneath his head on the back of the pew, one hand clutching his hair, fingers unconsciously tracing the few symbols that even patterned his scalp. He was so tired that he felt sure he would die of this terrible internal conflict.

After a time he became aware that there was another sitting in the darkness close by that he, in his distraction, had not noticed.

Kurt did not lift his head to see the stranger, nor listen as the choir began to warm up with the well-known strains of "Amazing Grace." He deepened the shadows of his figure as was his talent and hoped that this other wayfarer would deem seeing him as a mere trick of the light.

"... _how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me..."_

A wretch. That was all that was left of him. Wretched; unable to be saved by that which had been so monstrously revealed as a debacle, a fiction invented to assuage the madding crowd.

A certain hopelessness dredged an aching sob muffled into his sleeve.

There was the light touch of a hand on his arm.

"Leave me be," he mumbled, lightening his aura just enough to let see the deep blue fur and the demonic tail that draped over the back of the seat.

There was silence except for the strains of the chorus for a long time after that and Kurt was not sure if he slept or fell into a stupor of exhaustion. He thought he felt a touch, just a slight tracing over the etchings that he had carved into his own face and down the back of his neck. Later, he would remember snatches of a conversation that he wasn't sure had even consisted of spoken words.

"My son comes here often, when his hands start to hurt him."

"How vas he injured?"

"Oh, you know, battling oppression, bringing hope. That sort of thing."

Something was pressed into his hand.

"He'd want you to have this."

"Won't he miss it?"

"He has untold numbers of others wherever he goes. He carried something like it once and it brought great healing."

Kurt sat alone again, unsure if another person had even been there, and stared down at the small cross in his hand.


End file.
